Why You Should See Vienna Teng With Me: Part II

Okay, so on November 20th, Vienna Teng is finally returning to Seattle to support her new album.  So that gives me about three weeks to convince you why it is in your best interest to see Vienna Teng with me.  Last week, we covered a very comforting song in The Breaking Light.  Today, we will go with sad songs because they are, indeed, my favorite.  In case I wasn't clear last time, the link will be in the title of the song in the header.

Kansas

This is VT at her best.  Thematically, the song is about a break up, and that subject has been covered a million times a million through the history of song and story.  What Vienna does best though is to drape that theme in metaphor and beautiful imagery to give you something you don't expect.  In the case of this song, it's looking at the state of a relationship after the break up and comparing it to the flat endlessness of the landscape of Kansas.  "Our cities of clouds" and "our house of cards" -- these are the dreams and history that's built up in a relationship and then so jarringly laid flat on the table like Kansas. 

Yet the biggest reason why I love this song is because even though it is a sad song, it doesn't go the emo route of trying to show you the hurt or finding someone to blame.  As she says, "It's not regret, Just an unexpected accounting of debts, Only now called, No it's not regret, Just a remembrance is all, Of how close we had come."  In a sense, it is a sad song in the most clinical sense -- it's a haunting lament of what had happened without trying to get back to where they were.

This is why you should see Vienna Teng with me.  The music is beautiful, and although it's a sad song, you aren't punched in the face with the raw emotion of sadness, bitterness or anger.   It's just the blessed numbness of what is and what was. 

--Jonathan